WHO WE ARE

—by Lois Chazen

Sylvia Ann Hewlett, writer, lecturer and college teacher, is one of the many varied and interesting members of our congregation. Her work has revolved around the problems women face in today's world and her quest has been to help women achieve a balanced life. In her most recent book, Creating A Life: Professional Women and the Quest for Children, published in March by Talk Miramax Books, she writes, "Obviously there are some exceptional individuals who are able to reach for the sublime by making music, painting pictures—or playing baseball. But for ordinary mortals like myself, it is often a child who helps us 'touch the face of God.'"

Sylvia Ann Hewlett

The book and its author have received a great deal of press attention and have provoked much discussion in professional circles and among general readers. It was the focus of a Time Magazine cover article, "Making Time For A Baby" (April 15, 2002), just weeks after the book was published. Leslie Stahl interviewed her for a segment on CBS's 60 Minutes, and she has appeared on numerous television talk shows. Thoughtful, provocative book reviews have appeared nationwide and internationally in many national and international newspapers as well as in numerous professional journals.

In April, Sylvia was guest speaker at a symposium sponsored by Cambridge in America held at the University Club in New York. Cambridge is Sylvia's alma mater. In Washington, D.C this summer, Dr. Hewlett lectured on her book to Congressional interns. She said that she was delighted by their response and their astute questions.

Dr. Hewlett's personal journey is rather remarkable. She was born to schoolteacher parents in a working class district in South Wales. Her father, who eventually gave up the wish for a boy when his sixth daughter was born, told his girls repeatedly, "Marriage is no solution to your lives."

When she was thirteen, Sylvia's father took her to Cambridge University and told her that if she set her sights high enough and if she worked hard enough, she could gain admission and transform her life. This is exactly what she did. An outstanding student at Cambridge, she was selected as a Kennedy Scholar at Harvard University. She returned to Cambridge to complete an M.A., and earned her Ph.D. in Economics at London University. She was a Research Fellow at Cambridge's Girton College. She was then appointed Assistant Professor of Economics at Columbia University's prestigious Barnard College.

While teaching at Barnard, she met, fell in love with and married Richard Weinert, who had a child from an earlier marriage. A year later, they had a second child, their first baby together. Within ten days after giving birth, Sylvia had to be back at Barnard teaching. Ten hour workdays were routine and there was no possibility of parental leave, paid or unpaid. Although she was exhausted in the first few months after the birth, she continued a full teaching schedule.

Sylvia Ann Hewlett with her family.

Nearly two years later, she was working at her desk at Barnard just entering her sixth month of pregnancy when she rushed herself to the hospital. No one else was in the building. Tears running down her face, amniotic fluid running down her legs, she knew that she would lose the twins she was carrying. Although devastated and in deep mourning, she continued to teach at Barnard. A year and one half later, when reviewed for tenure, despite a highly commendable record, she was denied tenure. The Ad Hoc Committee at Columbia University stated that she, "allowed childbearing to dilute her focus." Before that decision was reached, she had tried to organize a committee to press for parenting leave. These efforts were rebuffed.

One cannot help but be impressed with Sylvia's remarkable courage and candor in revealing these highly personal moments. These first-hand recollections, however painful, give weight and meaning to the points she make in Creating A Life. Combined with her academic credentials, surveys, interviews and other research, Dr. Hewlett is a pre-eminent authority in her field. And happily, she offers possible solutions.

In Creating A Life, Sylvia urges all young women, not only competitive, successful women, to think early on where they want to be in their forties. She advises young women to pay equal attention in their twenties, to whether marriage and family are as important to them as a career. If so, they should plan for and act on their decision at once. Almost one-half of the growing numbers of top women executives in the United States do not have children, and of the many she interviewed, a large proportion reported that they never made a conscious decision not to have children. They were simply busy climbing the corporate ladder and thought they had time to think about it later. Often, they realized too late that their childbearing years were gone.

Despite all the scientific advances in fertility, the success rate for conception by older women is still low, and there are still many risks involved for mother and baby if a woman in her forties does succeed. Knowing all this, Sylvia wanted another child when she was 46. Undaunted by the facts, she persisted through many disappointments and gave birth to Emma just after her 51st birthday. Speak of determination and fulfilling goals!

Although legislation has somewhat improved the workplace's response to the needs of parents, society and government have not gone far enough to assist women in pursuing their careers while responding to family needs. In some ways, with longer workweeks and more travel involved in many occupations, succeeding in a profession or in the corporate world has become more complex and frustrating than ever for a woman.

Prior to writing Creating A Life, (a life for mother as well as child), Dr. Hewlett collaborated with the controversial Harvard professor Cornel West in research which developed into a book, The War Against Parents: What We Can Do For America's Beleaguered Moms and Dads,L (Houghton-Mifflin, 1999). They met when they were both consultants in domestic work force for the Clinton administration. The President referred to their research in a State of the Union Address, and later, Sylvia and Cornel West were dinner speakers at the White House.

It was through the Rev. Dr. John Buehrens, whom she met at Harvard, that she became acquainted with All Souls. She has been a member of the church for ten years. She has been a lecturer in the popular Lifelines series. Her topic was "How to Affirm and Empower Parents." In years past, Sylvia has given the Ware Lecture at the General Assembly of the Unitarian Universalist Association. In March, she and her husband accompanied Carolyn and Forrest Church to the Netherlands for the presentation to Nelson Mandela of this year's Four Freedoms Award , given by the Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt Institute of which she and Forrest are board members.

After leaving Barnard, she accepted a position as Executive Director of the Economic Policy Council where she worked for six years in the 1980's. The Council is a consortium of labor and business leaders who deliberate on important economic policy issues and make recommendations to government agencies and to the private sector. Although she negotiated a shorter, more flexible workweek for herself, she realized that her job would involve considerable travel. Unwilling to give up so much time away from her children, she resigned from the job.

"Creating a balance between family and professional life is a continuous process and well worth the effort," Sylvia said. She achieved this in the late eighties and early nineties, working at home. During the day, she was a full-time mother snatching moments here and there to write. Often, she wrote after midnight, producing within a few years, the highly acclaimed When the Bough Breaks: The Cost of Neglecting Our Children, A Lesser Life, and Child Neglect in Rich Nations. Taking Parenting Public: The Case for a New Social Movement, which she edited with Cornel West and Nancy Rankin, was published in 2002. She edited an earlier book, The Global Repercussions of U.S. Monetary and Fiscal Policy, in 1986 with Henry Kaufman.

In 1993, Sylvia founded and is still chairman of the National Parenting Association, a non-profit research organization, "devoted to improving the plight of children and to supporting parents in the workplace to have flexibility in their working day and in taking leaves of absence without fear of jeopardizing their jobs." The Association serves as consultants to corporations and other entities to raise awareness of parents' needs in the workplace. Dr. Hewlett lectures widely and plans to promote non-partisan legislation to implement these goals.